The instant invention relates to apparatus for the processing of materials that heat poorly or none at all by induction. Specifically this applies to bulk materials such as any carbonaceous material as for example coal, coke, lignite, peat, shale, tar-sands, and also ores, lime, limestone, etc. In the processing of bulk materials tonnages of the greatest magnitude must be heated uniformly, efficiently and economically in an environmentally acceptable way. In today's practices, bulk materials are heated by a direct heating means using combustion such as in a blast furnace or in a direct-pyrolysis shale-retort, or by an indirect heating means such as the heating of refractories by burning of a fuel and by having the refractories in turn heat the bulk materials as is the case in a coke oven or in an indirect-pyrolysis of shale.
The problems associated with the direct heating means are pollution to the environment and difficulty in control, and the problems associated with the indirect heating means are inefficiency in heat transfer and a requirement of excessive capital investment. The present invention overcomes the above problems by providing a plurality of compartments whose walls comprise a material which is adaptable to being heated by induction and wherein said plurality of compartments commonly share an induction coil means which surrounds said plurality of compartments. The prior art of record against the aforementioned applications of the applicant fail to teach the structure of the applicant.